LOST BY VON KLUGE

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 88, Issue 203, 25 August 1944, Page 5

LOST BY VON KLUGE

CO-ORDINATED CONTROL OF GERMAN FORCES Recd. 7.30 p.m. London, Aug. 24. Allied troops now have the freedom of France and von Kluge has lost co-ordinated control of the German forces, says Morley Richards, the Daily Express military commentator. He adds: Because of the weakness of the enemy’s resources, Allied troops can go ulj where they please as soon as supplies and tank repair units catch up with the forward columns. “The German 15th Army north of the Seine may not number more than seven divisions. A trickle of extremely poor-class soldiers is reported to be moving westward from Germany. They are not much better than cannon fodder. Talk of defence of the Somme 01 the Marne or, later, on the Maginot and Siegfried Lines does not amount to much because the enemy would need half a million men to stand on any of these obstacles. If every present survivor of the 7th Army escaped over the Seine von Kluge would still be short by a quarter of a million of his manpower total. The result of the Batt’e of France—and that means Western Europe, since Belgium and Holland could not be defended for long—has become the mathematical certainty General Montgomery said It would.